


Overloaded

by K_G



Series: Tight Pants & Maximum Angst 'Verse [4]
Category: Homestuck
Genre: Android!Hal, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Established Relationship, Existential Angst, Multi, Nobody Dies, Pale Roxy/Hal, Post-Game, Self-Harm, Suicidal Ideation, TP&MA!Verse, graphic description of surgery on an android with organic components, intrusive thoughts and crappy coping mechanisms for them
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-17
Updated: 2016-12-18
Packaged: 2018-09-09 05:32:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 8,287
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8877856
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/K_G/pseuds/K_G
Summary: When Hal finds himself struggling with intrusive thoughts about the nature of his existence and the mortality of his friends, he is unable to break out of the vicious thought cycle. He attempts something he recognizes is incredibly stupid to try and fix that, and it does not go in his favor.Dirk calls in the cavalry. Repairs are made. Comfort offered.Takes place a couple of years after A Little Give And Take





	1. Chapter 1

It is raining. 

 

Hal watches the drops slam against the window and shatter, gathering on the glass before sliding down. The sky outside is a deep, foreboding grey. Every few seconds forks of purple lightning crawl across the heavy cloud. 

His eyes track one droplet as it tracks down the window, until it draws level with them and the glow from his circuits stain it red. Hal flinches, and looks away. 

 

Dirk is asleep a few feet away, face buried in the side of his pillow. He occasionally stirs, muttering something illegible, before the frown on his brow smooths out and he returns to his deep sleep cycle. Hal aches to wake him, filled with unease and a creeping sense of despair, but Dirk needs the sleep far more than Hal needs to bother him him with his pithy emotional problems. At least, that’s what Hal tells himself as he gets up from the window seat and leaves the room. 

 

The house is so quiet, the silence disturbed only by the cracks of thunder. Hal walks through the hallway to the door at the end, hand hesitating before it closes over the handle. He hadn’t been outside in the rain before. His first time should not be on his own, in the middle of a storm, while Dirk is sleeping and won’t see it if he needs to message for help. Opening that door is therefore a ridiculous risk that he cannot logically justify. 

 

Hal turns the handle. 

 

The wind hits him first, like a physical slap across the face. His head snaps back, his skin stings, his sensors go haywire and he feels his body heat as he tries desperately to process the sensations assaulting him. This is the only thing he can think of to force his mind to stop viciously cycling, to find relief from the barbed thoughts that he can’t chase away. 

 

He takes one, trembling step, and then another, until he is out from underneath the shelter of the roof’s overhang. The rain is a sheet of water, and it slams against his body. He doesn’t manage to catch himself on his hands as he falls. The slick, wet concrete is like the roughest sandpaper against his cheek, and he screams. It’s too much. He knew it would be and he did it anyway, and he can feel the sharp pain of his split skin like he’d been impaled. His blood is hot, like fire in comparison to the freezing needles of rain beating down on him as he laid there. His suit is not waterproof, and it soaked through in moments. It hurts so much, and he’s vaguely aware that he’s screaming unendingly. 

 

Sharp.

 

Wet. 

 

Loud.

 

He tries in vain to push himself up, and then another peal of thunder roars out, a thousand times louder outside of the house, and Hal’s eyes are blank and unseeing as his processors overload from too much sensory feedback and send him into an emergency safe mode state. 

 

Darkness.


	2. Chapter 2

Dirk swears loudly and at length after he finally manages to haul Hal onto the bed. Sawtooth was off who the fuck knows where, and Squarewave wasn’t any help with heavy lifting. Without Hal controlling it, his body was all dead weight.

 

Dirk’s eyes go wide behind his shades, and he grits his teeth and shakes his head to try and clear that thought from his head. It’s just overload. He can fix it. He can fix it.

 

Can’t he?

 

He realizes he’s been staring at Hal’s limp body for over a minute with his hands balled into tight fists. Blood is smeared across his right cheek, which is marked up with vicious gravel-rash from where he seems to have fallen down.

 

Fuck.

 

“Why the fuck did you do that, Hal?” Dirk sits down beside him, hand raised and hesitant, before brushing limp white hair away from Hal’s blank, staring eyes. He’d been startled awake by the faint but unmistakeable sound of a strangled scream suddenly cutting off, and the banging of the front door. His heart had stopped in his chest when he’d run to the doorway and seen the crumpled black and white heap lying on the ground in the rain, steam rising from the exposed skin.

 

When he’d tried to shake Hal back to consciousness, he’d burned his hands. Even through the suit, the android was too hot to touch, and Dirk had been forced to put on his gloves and swaddle Hal in towels before he could be moved. Even now, after fifteen minutes of Dirk dragging him through the hall, his body still tangibly radiates heat.

 

Dirk sags back onto the bed, and opens trollian. He stares at Roxy’s name, and his fingers twitch before he opens the chat window.

 

\-- timaeusTestified [TT] started bothering tipsyGnostalgic [TG] at 2:27 --

TT: Hey Ro-Lal I have a small problem I need your assistance with.

TT: And by small, I mean actually fucking ridiculously huge.

TG: yo dirky whats up??

TG: i am v good at fixin big problems u called the right girl

TT: Hal overloaded. He went outside while I was asleep.

TG: in this weather?? wtf is he ok

TT: I don’t know.

TG: what do u mean u dont know

TT: I don’t know. He’s out. I’d say ‘out cold’, but given that I burned my hands picking him up, that expression isn’t really applicable right now.

TT: If I am being honest, I don’t even know what I want help with.

TT: Given that this hasn’t happened before, and our plans for dealing with it mainly consisted of ‘don’t let this happen’, I’m feeling out of my depth right now and also fucking terrified.

TG: kk im omw

TG: maybe get equius down here

TG: he did most of the building right

TT: Yeah. Okay. ETA?

TG: about 20 min give or take  
TG: is he still hot

TG: hottern than normal anyway ;)

TT: Is now really the time for that?

TG: look i need to laugh ok im worried too

TT: Yes, he’s still hot.

TG: kk try and lower his temp while u wait for me and horse troll to get there

\-- timaeusTestified [TT] ceased bothering tipsyGnostalgic [TG]  --

 

Dirk stares at Hal, still radiating heat, still staring blankly into the distance. He opens the soaking wet suit at the neck, and begins to peel it off the android’s body. Then he balls it up and tosses it aside, retrieving a dry towel from the linen closet. He opens up another chat window as he starts to dry off Hal’s body.

 

\-- timaeusTestified [TT] started bothering centaursTesticle [CT] at 2:31 --

 

TT: Hello, Equius.

CT: D--> Hello, Dirk  
CT: D--> This is unusual

TT: Yeah, sorry about the cold call bro. I need some help.

CT: D--> With what

TT: Hal overloaded himself. He went out in a storm, I don’t know why, and now he’s completely unresponsive. I’m going to reduce his core temperature as much as I can, but you did the majority of the engineering on his internal systems. Can you come over and help out?

CT: D--> I see

CT: D--> Yes, I can lend you my e%pertise

CT: D--> I will be there shortly

TT: Thanks dude. I’ll figure out a way to repay the favor.  

 

\-- timaeusTestified [TT] ceased bothering centaursTesticle [CT] --

 

Dirk’s hand slows, then stills over Hal’s chest.

 

“Hey. You’re going to be fine.” This is stupid. He knows Hal can’t hear him. “You’d better be.” His hand balls in the towel, and he swallows reflexively. Dirk picks up one of the damp towels and wipes the blood off Hal’s face with great care. “You fucking idiot,” he whispers, and then flash-steps to the kitchen to get some ice.  

 

Dirk makes a makeshift sling out of the damp and now slightly blood streaked towel, and fills it will all the ice the fridge has made. It doesn’t seem like enough, but it’ll have to do. He returns to his room, wads up the ice-filled towel, and presses it again Hal’s forehead. Priorities. CPU first. That way if the body is fried, maybe he can recover Hal, and he won’t be -

 

Something wet slides down Dirk’s cheek, and he pulls Hal’s body into his lap.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the chapter with robo-surgery. It also features some world-building, Roxy mercilessly flirting with poor Equius and being a BAMF, and some heavily researched technobabble.

 

“Hey, he awake yet?” Roxy startles Dirk, which is a sure-fire sign of how fucking out of it he is right now. She’s lugging a large metal canister under one arm, and he beckons her over. 

 

“No. I’ve been trying to cool him off, but I didn’t have that much ice. Thanks for coming.”

 

“No prob. You mind losing that towel?”    
  


“Nope.” Dirk gently lowers Hal back down to the bed, and spreads the towel over Hal’s face and upper body. 

  
“Aight cool.” Roxy sets the canister down on the floor, and gestures at Hal’s pelvis. “Maybe cover him up down south too, so that Equius won’t have a fuckin aneurysm when he gets here, as much as I’m enjoying the view.” Dirk laughs, sudden and unexpected, and Roxy grabs his hand. “He’s gonna be fine, Dirk.” 

 

“I know.” He lies, as much for her as himself. He can see the slight puffiness of her eyes. He’s grateful for his shades. “Thanks.” Another towel is spread over Hal’s lower half. 

 

“Back the fuck up, I don’t wanna splash you with this shit. And open a window so we don’t die, pls and thank.” 

 

Dirk does so as Roxy uncaptchalogues two massive bottles. She grins and sticks her hand down the neck of each one, retrieving a pair of elbow length, thick gloves; and a long handled ladle. The bottles vanish into the ether. Gloves on, she pops the seal on the canister and dips the ladle inside. Immediately, vapor spills over the edge of the cannister and spreads out over the floor. Dirk watches as she steadies her hand, and then carefully pours the liquid nitrogen out in a thin stream over Hal’s covered face. The damp towel instantly freezes at the points of contact, more vapor rising up and slowly dissipating. She does this a few more times to his head, and then proceeds to repeat the procedure on his covered chest. The ladle is recaptchalogued and the canister sealed again.

 

“That should do it. One Halcicle, freshly iced.” Long handled tongs flash into her hand, and she peels away the frozen towel covering the top half of his body, tossing it back over her shoulder. It shatters on the floor. “Oops. Probably should have just put that down.”

 

“Don’t worry about it.” He pauses. “Do I want to know why you had immediate access to liquid nitrogen?”

 

“Probs not.” Roxy puts the rest of her things away, and lets herself fall backward onto the bed. She blows some hair out of her eyes, and then punches Hal’s thigh. “Wtf was he thinking?”

 

Dirk sits beside her, absently tucking the stray lock of hair back into place. 

 

“I have no idea. He didn’t leave me any messages, I just found him out there after I heard…” He trails off. “I’m glad I found him.”

 

“Me too.” Roxy eyes him, her lips purse, but whatever she was going to say she decides not too. She puts the back of her hand against Hal’s stomach. “He’s not overheated anymore, at least. You waiting to open him up until Equius gets here?” 

 

“Yeah.” Dirk shrugs. “Also just in case he woke up. Didn’t want him to reboot and see me up to my elbows in his chest.” 

 

“Hello.”    
  
Dirk is up, katana out, and in a defensive stance in an instant. 

 

“Hey Equius. Maybe knock next time so you don’t scare my boy Dirk here.” Roxy raises a hand in a wave at the figure stood in the shadows by the doorway.

 

“Holy shit man. We need to put fucking bells on you or something.”

 

“Language.”

 

“Omg are you serious right now?” Roxy sits up, grinning. “You’re lookin a lil’ stiff buddy, need some help getting that pole outta your muscley butt?” She winks. The air suddenly smells like Dirk usually does after an intense workout. 

 

“I. You.” He splutters, and her grin widens. 

 

“C’mon big guy. Let it out. I believe in you. You’re among salacious pals. Fuuuuuuu-”

“Roxy, really? Right now?” Dirk recaptchalogues his katana and rolls his eyes.

 

“Sshh you, this is important. Say it with me, handsome. Fuuuuuuuck.”

 

“This is 100di%.” Somehow, Dirk can  _ hear _ the quirk. Equius doesn’t seem that legitimately angry, however. There is even a hint of a smile on those compressed black lips. Dirk looks between him and Roxy, and raises an eyebrow. “But if it will satisfy you.” 

 

“Mmm you know it will.”

 

“Fuck.” Immediately, a deep blue blush spreads across Equius’s face, and he covers it with his hands. Dirk’s other eyebrow shoots up. He opens a trollian window and a visor extends down over Roxy’s eye from a hairclip.

  
  


\-- timaeusTestified [TT] started bothering tipsyGnostalgic [TG] at 3:21 --

 

TT: Roxy. Ro-lal.

TT: I need to know. 

TT: Have you been riding that stallion?

TG: omg dirk rude u dont just ask someone if theyve been ridin horses

TG: no 

TG: not yet anyways ;) ;) ;)

TT: I’m impressed. But really, can we fix Hal now? You can flirt with Tall and Strong over here later. Making him drown us in sweat doesn’t really contribute to that goal.

TG: i made u smile didnt i

TG: secondary mission goal acmplishd

TG: srsly dirk hals gonna be fine

TG: u have 3 of the smartest peeps in the new universe right here

TG: if we SOMEHOW dont get him back online we can get jade and sollux up in here 2 

TG: by our powers combined and all that sweet shiz

TT: Yeah. Thanks.

TT: Wow. He’s really having some trouble there. Did you break the troll, Roxy? He hasn’t looked up yet.

TG: u gotta understand that he just dropped some MAD IMPROPRIETY in front of us dude

TG: not such a big deal with u but he regards me as like

TG: human royalty or some shit

TG: especially what with killing fish hitler

TG: me and nepeta are working on a joint offensive to get him 2 loosen up on the class thing tho

TG: apparently he used to be fuckin insufferable about it but being part of hal helped wrt that

TG: hey hes gettin himself together lets get back to our sicknasty rescue mission

 

\-- tipsyGnostalgic [TG] ceased bothering timaeusTestified [TT] --

 

Equius clears his throat, and Roxy’s visor retracts as the troll finally raises his head from his hands. His own, square shades have a new fine crack running through the lenses. 

 

“Shall we get to the matter at hand?”

 

“That’d be great. Can you carry him out onto the table in the kitchen?” Equius nods, and picks up Hal like Dirk would pick up a spanner, carefully ensuring the towel stays put to preserve the android’s dignity. Not that Hal would care, but Dirk appreciates the gesture. There’s a dim spark of appreciation for watching the troll’s muscles work, but he’s a tad too busy to really drink in the sight. Dirk uncaptchalogues his tool box with a muttered and somewhat shitty rhyme, which normally he’d be disappointed in himself for, but given the circumstances he gives himself a little slack for once. He follows Equius and Roxy out to the kitchen, and purses his lips for a moment as he weighs his options. “I’ll get the dermal seal peeled back now and then you can take a look inside the chassis while I move up and check the cranial processing array for signs of damage. Roxy, if there is none I’ll hook you up to the emergency input port and you can work your magic.”

 

“This is an acceptable plan.”

 

“Yeah, get to slicing.” 

 

Dirk considers how to best make the initial incision, and then runs his fingertip down the line of Hal’s breastbone, feeling for the almost imperceptible bump where- 

 

Got it. 

 

He increases the magnification on his shades to five hundred times normal, retrieving the diamond-edged scalpel from his toolbox and pressing it with the gentlest touch possible to that tiny, raised bump. They had placed the maintenance access in a place where as little circuitry would be disrupted as possible, but the intricate network of synthetic blood vessels was harder to work around, and blood beaded on Hal’s nearly colourless skin. 

 

There was a very specific path that the blade needed to follow to avoid several major arteries, and Dirk sucks his bottom lip between his teeth as he slides the blade through the dermis. His toolkit has been expanded considerably since the creation of Hal’s body, and there are two primary blood vessels that he had no choice but to sever. He clamps the bleeds with hemostats. He doesn’t have blood bags on hand to do a major transfusion. 

 

Hal may be able to rely on other power source in case the hemoelectric current was disrupted, but Dirk would rather he didn’t have too. 

 

The retractor is next, and once the incision has been sufficiently pulled away Dirk can see the clear protective thermoplastic composite shell that shields Hal’s internal components. It is beneath the silicone coated, cobalt-nickel alloy ‘ribs’, which are easily removed by feeling for clasps near the breastbone. That, too, is segmented, and Dirk lifts away the pieces that obstruct access and sets them aside on the table. 

 

“Wow. Never seen inside him before.” Roxy peers over his shoulder, and whistles. “This your work, Eq?”

 

“Yes.” 

 

“Niiiiiice.” Dirk doesn’t have to look, he can hear her grin. “Looks like some fiddly shit. You must be pretty good with those strong hands of yours. Maybe you can show me a few tricks sometime.”

 

Equius makes a choked sound, and Dirk rolls his eyes again. 

 

“Linen closet. Second door on the right in the hall we just came from. Try not to break the handle.”

 

“...Thank you.”

 

Heavy footsteps fade away as Dirk further increases the magnification settings on his shades, and takes out a pair of forceps with an impossibly thin, hooked point. 

 

“You’re going to give him a heart attack.”

 

“He loves it.”

 

“I can smell that.” 

 

“It’s not a BAD smell. Kinda musky. I dig it.”

 

The tip of the forceps is carefully inserted into three, shallow channels in the shell. A slight counter-clockwise twist in each and Dirk hears a faint click as a sequence is triggered. The shell retracts out of sight, exposing Hal’s core. Even with the application of liquid nitrogen previously, there’s still a lingering heat running through the intricate network of hoses that transport blood and coolant around Hal’s body. In the very center sits the unassuming, fist sized cylinder that functions as his ‘heart’ - the hemoelectricity generator. It is still quietly whirring, much to Dirk’s relief. Bleeding could be explained by backed up pressure in case of a catastrophic hardware failure, but the generator still functioning ruled out a major potential cause for Hal’s unresponsive state. 

 

“Hm.” A low, gravelly voice says, inches away from his ear, and Dirk nearly drops the forceps. He fumbles, catches them, and immediately steps away from the table and turns off the magnification. 

 

He’s cool. It’s cool. 

 

Roxy sniggers. Fucking void players, man.    
  


Equius is wearing a heavy-duty sweatband, long hair tied up in a ponytail, and he mops his face with one of Dirk’s last clean towels before leaning down to inspect the other, more alien aspects of Hal’s inner workings. He takes another retractor from Dirk’s toolbox between two fingers, handling it as delicately as possible, and begins easing apart the obscure net of hoses. His strong features are set in a deep, focused frown as he works. 

 

Dirk takes his place at the end of the table. A full-face breathing mask, thick insulated gloves, a bib to protect his neck and chest, and inch-thick goggles are donned, and he is thankful his next task doesn’t require scalpel useage. Instead, his fingers search along the nape of Hal’s neck, looking for five similar bumps just under the surface. It’s a lot harder with the gloves. They all need to be pressed at once, and he does a mental five-count before doing so. A seam opens in the dermal layer from the base of Hal’s neck to his forehead, and through the blood vessels beneath. They are automatically clamped by tiny clips, and Dirk considers employing that system for every one of them if they ever do make Hal another body. The shell beneath also automatically parts as well, a good two inches thicker than the one protecting Hal’s torso, and Dirk flips it up to gain access to the inside of Hal’s cranium. A blast of pressurized, freezing air is released as the secondary and tertiary cooling systems are exposed. They immediately halt, and will remain non-functional for safety purposes until the shell is closed again. The temperature in the kitchen drops by several degrees.

 

Thousands of tiny exabyte chips, no bigger than the head of a pin, are arrayed in orderly rows in slots on the centuple-core processor. Beneath that are the many CPU chips needed to handle the complex processes of Hal’s mind. There’s enough storage in those memory chips to contain the summation of human, troll, and probably a good five other sapient races combined history, and even then Hal would likely need to upgrade to zettabyte chips within the next decade. 

 

Dirk remembers the moment when he slid the last chip into place, the surge of triumph and glee. His shades had a hundred petabytes worth of data storage capacity - a necessity when they housed Hal, now a gross overcompensation - and that had limited Hal’s development to a certain point. It was one of the main reasons the AI had pleaded with him to reach out to Equius and build him a body. He’d described it as dealing with a chronic migraine every moment of the day as he’d drawn closer and closer to maxing out the available storage. 

 

There were supposed to be dozens of tiny, blinking white lights. Instead, there was one larger one on the top of the processor, flashing intermittently in red. Manual reboot required. Dirk’s shoulders sagged in relief. This would be relatively easy, with Roxy’s help.

 

“Hey Equius, everything looking clear down there?”

 

“I am refilling the coolant reservoir, and I replaced one hose. The innermost tube had ruptured. Aside from that, there is nothing else that needs to be repaired here. Is there any sign of damage to the heat pipes or the airbladder?”

 

Dirk increases the magnification on his lenses again, and a program activates as his eyes scan over the parts in question, searching for any flaws in the surfaces. 

 

“Nope, we’re good.”  The temperature inside Hal’s skull has slowly equalized with that of the kitchen, so Dirk removes his safety gear and recaptchalogues it. “Alright, Roxy. Once I seal him back up, it’ll be your turn. His system needs a manual reboot, and there may be some corrupted data from the moment of overload that you’ll need to recover if you can.” 

 

Roxy gives him a thumbs up, and Equius steps back from the table after a few more minutes easing parts back into their original positions. Dirk takes his place. Roxy passes him a packet with a tiny surgical needle and some 0.01 polyglycolide suture thread inside. Since Hal doesn’t need to worry about infections, Dirk tears the packet open with his teeth, threads the needle with a steady hand, and quickly sews the ligatures in place on the clamped blood vessels. Hal’s nano-repair bots will fix the minor bleeds easily enough. The breastbone sections and missing ribs are clipped back into place after Dirk triggers the closing of the shell, and he removes the retractor. The incision is quickly and efficiently sutured with the finest thread he has, and within fifteen minutes there’ll be no sign on Hal’s skin that there ever was one in the first place. 

 

Roxy hops onto the table and sits cross legged next to Hal’s head. She uncaptchalogues a bottle, looks at Dirk and winces by way of apology, and then smashes it on the table leg in order to release her laptop.

 

“We need to get you a different modus.”

 

“Indeed.” Equius says, his voice again coming from behind Dirk. Dirk doesn’t flinch this time. “Perhaps an Array modus?”

 

“That’s so boring though.” Roxy says, not looking up as she pulls out a thin cord from a compartment in the side of her laptop and dexterously slips it into place in Hal’s skull. 

 

“It would also be considerably less messy.” Dirk and Equius say at the same time. Their eyes meet through their shades, and both smile slightly. 

 

“Omg boredom in stereo.” The fingers of Roxy’s left hand fly across her keyboard in a blur of motion, while the right controls her laptop trackpad. “I’ll clean up the mess, don’t worry.”

 

“Please, allow me.” Equius says, and Dirk’s eyebrows raise again. “I 100cated a debris collection hamper and accompanying bristled handgrip in the...linen closet.”

 

“Sure go nuts,” Roxy says distractedly, and Dirk hears a series of beeps. “Thanks.”

 

Equius beams, fully exposing his sharp teeth. There are only a couple of gaps in that smile now, his teeth must be regrowing. He hustles off in pursuit of the dustpan and brush.

 

“Aight, manual reboot in progress, eight percent complete and counting. There’s a fuckton of blocks I gotta fix up, but gimmie ten minutes and all that sweet, sweet data will be all unscrambled and back where it belongs.”

 

“You’re a goddamn hero Roxy.”

 

“I know right? You can pay me back later with a movie marathon and some good ice cream.”

 

“Deal.” 

 

Equius returns to the kitchen, and already the handles of the dustpan and brush have been crushed in his grasp. 

 

“Uh. My apologies,” he says to Dirk, before dropping to his knees to start clearing up the glass shards. He grunts quietly as he does, and his skin outright fucking glistens in the light. It is very apparent that he’s getting off on this. Dirk is well aware that he’s in no position to judge there, though.

 

“It’s cool. Thanks.” 

 

Dirk leans against the kitchen counter, arms crossed. He stares up at the ceiling, letting his eyes unfocus while he waits. Eventually Equius straightens up and empties the glass shards into the trash can. He clears his throat again, visibly uncomfortable, before very gingerly reaching out and patting Dirk’s shoulder. Surprisingly, it didn’t hurt.

 

“I am sure that Ro%y will be able to retrieve any corrupted data.” 

 

“Damn right I will,” She chimes in absently. “We’re at sixty five percent, bee-tee-dubs.” 

 

“Would you. Prefer I leave?” Equius continues, mimicking Dirk’s shance. Dirk blinks. 

 

“Only if you want too, bro. You’re his friend too.”

 

“I suppose that I am.” 

 


	4. Chapter 4

“Kay,” Roxy pulls the cord from the jack in Hal’s skull and returns it and her laptop to her sylladex. “Put his hair back on, reboot will be done in forty five seconds. All data recovered, because I am a fuckin’ wizard.” 

Dirk moves in a flash, and in six quick movements the cranial shell and dermal layers have been put back in place. Only messy hair indicates that anything happened at all. 

“Hey Eq, you might wanna hold his shoulders down. I’ll take his feet. There was a massive fuckin’ input spike before his system overloaded, obvs, and I did some quick work to help him process the remains of it before he wakes up, but he’s probably not gonna be real happy about it. Dirk, give him something to bite on. Ten seconds.” 

Equius moves into place, flattening his palms on Hal’s shoulders. Roxy grabs both his ankles and her biceps flex. Dirk’s mind races, he panics, he uncaptchalogues a smuppet and shoves its plush proboscis between Hal’s teeth. Equius blanches, Roxy barks out a laugh, but before any of them can say anything, Hal’s body begins to violently convulse. Dirk steps back just in time to avoid the whiplash slap of a flailing arm, and watches with wide, frightened eyes as the light surges back into Hal’s circuitry and he screams around the smuppet. His back arches, and Roxy swears and rises on tip-toe, adding her body weight to her strength. 

“Hal, we’ve got you. It’s okay. You’re safe,” she says through gritted teeth, and Equius moves one hand to Hal’s forehead to stop him smashing his head against the tabletop. Even a foot away from them, Dirk can feel the surge of heat rising off the android, and his eyes dart to Roxy’s hands. He’s not going to be the only one with burns now. “Hal, can you hear me? I know babe, I know it hurts. Let it out. I’m here. Dirk’s here. Fuck, even Equius is here, how badass is that?”

“Hello,” Equius dutifully intones, and Dirk coughs and finds his voice.

“Yeah, hey.” He’s immediately filled with a sick sense of self-loathing, that that’s the only thing he can think to say while Hal convulses on their kitchen table. He flinches as stuffing bursts out of the smuppet snout, and darts forward to snatch the tufts of polyfill away. Hal’s pupils are tiny pinpricks, and his circuits are flashing like they’re at a goddamn rave. 

“Dirk, turn off the lights. Should’a thought of that before I started the reboot. Go grab his plating too, and a suit for when he’s finished-” His left ankle escapes her hold, and his heel drums frantically on the table for a few seconds before she manages to catch it again. “-Seizing.”

He follows her instructions with mechanical precision, mind reeling. With the lights off, the kitchen is plunged into near total darkness in the pre-dawn hours, the strobing glow of his eyes and circuits the sole source of illumination. Retrieving a fresh suit and Hal’s weighted plating was simple enough - He’d taken the plating off before heading out, evidently. He grabs a pair of crimson, nylon legwarmers from Hal’s dresser drawer as well, and then his hands start to shake. He captchalogues Hal’s things before he can drop them, and rests his burned hands on the top of the dresser. The sharp, throbbing pain had barely been noticeable while he was working on Hal’s unconscious body. 

“What did I do?” He whispers to the empty air. He reviews recent interactions they’d had, finds nothing that makes him twinge with guilt. Things had been great, actually. They’d spent three hours yesterday collaborating on a re-write of Pony Pals #18: The Saddest Pony. Dirk had laughed so hard at one point he’d nearly passed out. 

The screams have stopped, Dirk digs his nails into the palms of his hands. The extra pain forces him to focus, and he takes a deep breath. He can figure out where he went wrong later. He turns, and makes his way back to the kitchen.


	5. Chapter 5

It burns. Every synthetic nerve in his body feels like someone is holding a blow torch to them. He feels every drop of rain like a hypodermic needle, the archived sensory input flooding through him at five times the actual speed.

Purple light, crashing thunder, rough cement against his face, dirt abrading the cuts on his cheek and it’s so cold, he’s freezing, he’s burning, it’s so loud it’s so wet it’s so cold-

 

White light. Voices and words that get scrambled and processed as static. Pain, more pain, everything hurts so much and something is unbearably loud it’s too loud why is it so loud make it stop make it stop make it stop make it-

 

No light. 

 

Pressure on his head, his shoulder, his ankles. 

 

Something firm warm beneath him. 

 

Wood.

 

 

 

A table. 

 

 

 

 

He’s on the table in the kitchen in the house he shares with Dirk. 

 

It’s so loud because he is screaming. He stops doing that. 

 

Something is in his mouth. Fabric and stuffing. He spits it out. 

 

He’s so hot, whoever is holding him will be scalded, his surface temperature is one hundred and twenty-eight degrees, who is holding him-

 

Roxy. The hands on his ankles are familiar, he knows their shape almost as well as his own. And the hands on his shoulder and head  _ were _ his own at one point. Equius. Roxy and Equius are holding him down, grounding him on the table. 

 

“Hey there, glowstick. Welcome back.” 

 

Roxy’s voice is weirdly distorted, like he’s hearing it through water, and he blinks and recalibrates his aural sensors. Everything is off, and he feels like he might float away at any moment. 

 

”-uius, you really gotta get on those tear ducts dude, being able to cry would do like. Several metrics of fucktons for helpin’ him with emotional processin’.”

 

“I do not think a ‘fuckton’ is a legitimate unit of measurement.”

 

“Hah! Aw, I’m proud of you. Twice in one night.”

 

“Hrk.”

 

“Hey, don’t get sweat in his eyes. Here, can you lift him down? Let’s head to the futon.” 

 

The hands on his ankles pull away, and he makes a high noise of distress before he finds himself cradled against a very familiar, very sweaty chest. 

 

“This is 100d, I-”

 

“Relax big blue, I already checked with Nepeta and she’s cool with loanin’ you out for emergency cuddle duties. Check your messages, and make with the movin’. You can sit in the middle with him. Oops, watch the towel-”

 

Hal lets himself just listen, closing his eyes and soaking in the relative coolness of Equius’s skin. His body is returning to acceptable temperature parameters, and he attempts to apologize to them both for likely burning them, but all that comes out is a string of gibberish. He sets to recalibrating his vocal interface as well, and then decides it’s best just to perform a complete system check. He blinks rapidly as errors pop up across the board, and sets about starting to resolve them. He knows Roxy and Equius are talking, he can still dimly hear their voices, but it’s just meaningless noise. 

 

He went outside in the storm. Why did he do that? His memories of the moments prior to his overload are jumbled, although they’ve clearly been tidied already. It’s a simple matter for him to finish the process that he assumes Roxy started, and when all the information clicks into place he can feel his cheeks heating in mortification.

 

With absolutely no margin for error in his calculations, that was, by and far, the most stupid decision he’d ever made. Hal can’t even make himself feel better about it by pretending there had been a good reason for his taking the risk in the first place. Even as he remembers why he did it - the looping thoughts he couldn’t break free from, arguments playing back and forth ten thousand times in an instant - he knows there were far less perilous methods to derail the train of intrusive thoughts. 

 

His maintenance protocols complete, comprehension of sound and sensation return to him. Roxy’s fingers are threaded through his hair, Equius’s hands resting on his thighs. His back is pressed against the big troll’s chest. It’s comforting. 

 

“I-” Still not quite right, his voice sounds as though it has been put through a noise filter. A few adjustments, and then he tries again. “Thank you.”

 

“Ayyy, cat doesn’t have your tongue after all.” He can hear the raw relief in Roxy’s voice, and feels a spike of shame that makes his circuitry run dull. He turns his head so he can meet her eyes, and raises a hand to lay the back of it against her cheek.

 

“I am sorry.”

 

“Psssssssh.” She replies, even as she leans into the touch and cups his hand with her free one. “You’re okay, that’s what’s important.”

 

“Thank you.” He tilts his head back, and smiles. “And thank you, bro. I appreciate the cavalry coming to pull my pert ass out of the dirt.”

 

“Of course.” Equius’s tone left no doubt that he would do it again if needed, and Hal’s smile grows. “There were a few repairs needed, but no critical system failures. You will not do that again.”

 

“I...yeah. Hey, where’s Dirk? Is he okay?” Sudden panic, his eyes flash around the room and he tries to stand but Equius’s hands refuse to budge. Hal could probably free himself if he really wanted too, but Roxy’s easy smile reassures him that nothing catastrophic happened while he was shut down.

 

“He’s fine, just went to get you some clothes. Figure you’ll want your suit back on. Although, if you wanna go without, I don’t think anyone here will complain.” Roxy waggles her eyebrows outrageously, and Equius’s fingers flex on his thighs as he swallows. Hal can feel moisture against his back from a sudden surge of perspiration. 

 

“I don’t think I will trial the nudist life just yet. Maybe next year. I know, it’s a crime to hide my sweet robobod away from the world. I could probably make bank pimping myself out to figure drawing classes, or maybe posing as a statue in an art gallery. That’d be a cool gig.” His circuits flare with his enthusiasm as an idea strikes. “Speaking of art galleries, we should absolutely go check out the closest one sometime in the next month, see what kind of fine art the denizens of this new universe have been creating. You should come too, big man. We can wear berets, Roxy can recline on a chaise lounge with some sparkling water and we can critique the artistic merit of each peice.”

 

“That doesn’t sound objectionable.” 

 

“By which he means hell fuckin’ YES, I love that plan.” Roxy grins, and then presses a smooch against his hand. “You and Dirk and Eq ABSOLUTELY need to get out your houses more. Fuck yeah, cultural field trip.”

 

Hal hears the incredibly faint sound of Dirk’s approaching footsteps while Roxy is laughing and brainstorming potential gallery hijinks, and Equius’s ears twitch as the troll does as well. He lifts his hands to free Hal from his hold, and Hal is up and running. 

 

He’s a blur of white with streaks of red, and then his arms are around Dirk, his head buried in the crook of his neck. Dirk’s hands go around him as well, fingers digging against the bare skin of Hal’s back. He makes a choked sound, his fingers shake, and Hal is taking Dirk’s head in his hands, tilting it up, pressing kisses over his cheeks, his nose, his lips.

 

“I’m sorry, Dirk. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry.” He murmurs, and his voice is shaky.

 

“God.” Dirk presses his forehead against Hal’s, his hands move from Hal’s back to his hair. His eyes are squeezed tightly shut, and his throat works reflexively. “I’m glad you’re okay. I thought-” 

 

“I know, I’m sorry.”

 

“Why, dude? Jesus fuck, of all the times to test your boundaries, why in the middle of the biggest storm of the year?”

 

“I don’t know.” No, that was a lie. He’d wanted to hurt. He’d wanted pain, to be overwhelmed, to shut down. He’d wanted to stop. “No, I. I was thinking too much. I needed to stop. I know it was stupid, it was so fucking stupid, I could have done a dozen other things instead, but I just…” Hal trails off, and Dirk’s fingers bunch in his hair. His eyes open, and he’s staring into Hal’s like he’s searching for something, frowning deeply. 

 

“Were you...trying to hurt yourself?” 

 

Hal hears the creaking of the futon as Roxy stands up, and she crosses the room to hug him from behind. Her hair tickles his bare shoulder. 

 

“S’ok, Hal. Nobody’s gonna yell at you.” Her voice is low, soothing, and Hal releases tension he hadn’t even consciously recognized he was holding. 

 

“I think so. Yes.” Dirk’s eyes widen, and his expression shifts between several hard-to-identify emotions before settling into one of grim understanding.

 

“Put your clothes on. You’ll relax more when you’re grounded. Here, I’ll help.” Dirk releases him and uncaptchalogues Hal’s things, opening up the suit at the neck and then folding it down. Hal steadies himself on Roxy - he still feels off-balance, his gyroscopes must also need adjustment - and Dirk helps him roll the compression suit onto his body. Dirk closes the neck, smooths out some wrinkles over Hal’s chest. His hand flattens and stays there for a moment, and then he puts the plating on for him. 

 

“Thank you.”

 

“Hal.” His head jerks up at the unusual tone, and Dirk is still staring at him. He opens his mouth to ask what Dirk needs, and the human closes the gap between them and presses their lips together. Roxy whoops and claps as Dirk kisses him, and it’s filled with barely restrained desperation. He kisses Hal like he hadn’t seen him in a year, like he thought Hal had died-

 

Oh.

 

Hal wraps his arms around Dirk again and holds him as close as he can. In all his poorly thought out plans, he hadn’t once seriously considered that Dirk would be adversely affected by him doing something foolish to himself. 

 

It seems he was incorrect. 

 

Hal has never been happier to be incorrect. 

 

Dirk releases him, stepping back with fists balled at his sides. 

 

“Couch.”

 

“Yeah, c’mon Hal. Get that cute boot back over there. Ay, any of you want somethin’ to drink? You guys do have things other than orange crush, right?”

 

“I would STRONGLY appreciate some milk, if there is any avai100ble.”

 

“Yes, we have a wide variety of beverages available. Roxy, you will find metal milkshake cups in the second cupboard from the right.” Hal replies, and Dirk gives her a thumbs up for some soda. The two of them head back to the futon, where Equius is sat primly in the middle, hands folded in his lap. He takes up quite a bit of space, and Hal is hardly going to tell him to move, so he resumes his previous perch on Equius’s lap. 

 

Dirk raises an eyebrow, but sits on the left side of the troll. He leans down and picks up the towel Hal had left behind, and hands it to Equius, who takes it with a strained sound of acknowledgement. They sit in silence until Roxy prances back over, preciously holding their drinks. She didn’t bother with a glass for Dirk, just handing him the bottle. He raises it in a salute. Equius takes the metal cup with great care, and when Hal tilts his head back to look up at him there’s a hint of a pleased smile on his lips. 

 

“Thank you.”

 

“No probs.” Roxy perches on the other side of Equius, and leans over to pat Hal’s knee. “Alright, bucko. The three peeps who know your roborain better than anyone else are here, so spill the juicy deets. What’s on your overclocked mind?”

 

Hal snickers.

 

“I suppose you’re right, there.” 

 

“You know it, bob.” She winks. “So why’d you try and turn yourself into a lightning rod? Crispy wouldn’t be a good look on you, you know.”

 

Dirk’s fingers brush against his, a question. Hal opens his hand, and folds their fingers together. 

 

“I was thinking too much.” That’s a good start, even if just admitting that out loud causes his circuits to flash and temperature to rise by a couple of degrees. Roxy takes his other hand and rubs circles on his palm with her thumb. “I was considering the future. I didn’t like the likely simulations I ran, and kept running them over again in the hopes that some factor would change. I knew this wouldn’t work, but I couldn’t stop myself.”

 

“‘Kay, so what about the future was buggin’ you so much? So far it seems p fuckin’ neat.” Roxy leans her head on Equius’s arm. There’s the sound of compressing metal as his fingers tighten around the cup, and Roxy plucks it from his hand. “Lemme hold onto that for you, big blue. Don’t want you cryin’ over spilt milk.” 

 

“Many things, but the most distressing was the inevitable...mortality...of all of you.” 

 

Dirk’s hand tightens around his, and Roxy makes a soft ‘ _ Oh’ _ sound. Equius nods. 

 

“I have been troubled by simi100r e%istential concerns in the past. Not on such a grand scale as the more noble b100ded and yourself, I imagine. Time canters forward faster than any of us would care for.” His voice rumbles through Hal’s back, and he closes his eyes and leans back against that expansive chest.

 

“It was extremely unpleasant.” He pauses. “In every simulation I ran, my endstate was that of complete isolation until some extinction level event destroyed me, or I destroyed myself. I don’t want to think about either of those outcomes.”

 

“Hal…” Roxy shuffles a little closer, kisses his shoulder. “We’re not goin’ anywhere anytime soon. I’m livin’ until at least a hundred outta spite if nothin’ else.”

 

“That is...unfortunately scant comfort, on the grander scale. I will treasure every moment we have together, but when you are gone, when none of you are left - What is there for me? Even in this body, I will likely outlive several generations of all the species on this planet before I’m in need of any serious maintenance work, barring another incident like tonight. I very much doubt that my consciousness will enter the dream bubbles when my hardware has broken down, if they even still function as the afterlife in this new universe. ”

 

“Honestly, I dunno.” Roxy frowns, and Dirk’s hand tightens even more around his. “I think you’ll figure it out at the time? You’re like, the smartest fuckin’ person on the planet. Though I reckon Jade could hold up p well against you too. But when we’re all dirt, there’ll be more peeps to know. You’ll probs make a ton of friends way cooler than we’ve ever been.”

 

“I’m fairly sure that’s a statistical impossibility.”

 

“Pfffft.” 

 

“Hal...do you want me to give you a human lifespan?” Dirk’s voice startles him, and his head jerks to the left. “It wouldn’t be difficult to engineer a subroutine linked to a countdown. When it ran out, it’d just. Turn you off.”

 

He’s clearly uncomfortable with that idea, with this whole situation. Dirk’s expression is one of potent self-loathing, and Hal squeezes his hand in return. 

 

“I will think on it. That certainly seems a more acceptable option than slowly losing my mind to entropy.”

 

“Yeah.” The four of them sit in silence for a few minutes, until Dirk speaks again. “Can you try...not to do that again, though? Fuck knows I understand the urge to head death off at the pass, so I understand if you can’t promise that. Could you message one of us first if you ever get the urge to go short yourself out again?”

 

“Yes. I can do that.” Hal sighs. “I’m sorry. I didn’t want to wake you up. I did not plan, exactly, for the outcome I got. My primary objective was to force myself to focus on processing sensation as opposed to running the same fucking sims over and over again.”

 

“Asshole.” Dirk said, but a small smile took the sting out of the word. “How many fucking times have you helped debug my brain when I’m stuck on some self-hating bullshit?”

 

“Like now?” The smile falters a little, but he doesn’t deny it. “Thank you. I will bear that in mind. And my distress was not your fault, so stop beating the shit out of yourself.”

 

Roxy laughs. 

  
  
“Fuckin’ told.”

 

“The three of you use the basest language. I cantermagine being so dep100rably uninhibited.” 

 

“Aw, have you forgotten our time together so soon, my dude?” Hal grins up at Equius, whose cheeks flush blue. “If I recall correctly, and there’s a ninety nine point six five three recurring possibility that I do, you had the time of your afterlife when I helped you let your hair down.”

 

“That was different.”

 

“Nope.”

 

“Yes it was.”

  
“No.”

 

“Yes.”

 

“No.”

 

“Yes.”

 

“No.”

 

“Ye-”

 

“Alright, we are not doin’ this.” Roxy lets go of Hal’s hand, puts Equius’s cup down on the floor, and puts her hands over both of their mouths. “Shhhhh.”

 

Dirk laughs, Equius splutters, and it breaks the remaining tension between them all. 

 

“Hey. We’re all in one place for once. I could put on one of bro’s spectacularly shitty movies and we could turn this intervention into a sleepover.” 

 

“Aw hell yeah, that’s the best idea you’ve ever fuckin’ had Dirk.” Roxy squeals with delight and releases Hal and Equius, who immediately leans down to grab his cup and drain of milk in two, long draws. “What do you say, big boy? You game? I’ve been itching to braid that mane of yours, gotta say.”

 

“That is e%tremely improper, I-” He pauses. “I cannot believe that you asked Nepeta if she would approve of this foalish, 100d idea.” Another pause, and Roxy’s grin spreads wider and wider until it looks almost painful. “I cannot believe that she apphooves. You are a terrible influence on her.”

 

“Yep.”

 

“No- Wait.”

 

“Hah, gotcha!” She sticks out her tongue. “Go grab a movie, Dirk. Let’s make this happen.”

 

Hal smiles as Equius struggles with his instincts, before eventually acquiescing.

 

They hadn’t done this before. As Dirk settles back on the futon and Roxy slings a bowl of popcorn down on Hal’s lap while the eye searing opening credits play, he resolves to make a routine of it. 

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



End file.
